Philadelphia garage rockers Bleeding Rainbow -- formerly Reading Rainbow -- have been busy prepping their new album, Yeah Right, due out 1/29 on Kanine Records. Three songs from Yeah Right have been released already: the fuzzy, anthemic "Waking Dream," the driving, punk-inflected "Pink Ruff," and the dreamy and catchy "Drift Away." Founding… More »

A couple of weeks ago, Brooklyn rockers Nude Beach dropped the memorable clip for "Some Kinda Love," a clip where an invisible narrator went through some kind of nervous breakdown. But, that wasn't the only truly notable thing about the video; in the clip, the narrator walks us through the day jobs of Nude… More »

Over the past three years, the great Huntsville, Alabama rap duo G-Side have released three full albums, with another, Island, coming in November. And even more impressive: They've done all this while working full-time at two not-exactly-glamorous jobs. ST 2 Lettaz shoots low-budget music videos now, but he only recently left his job at a… More »

Brooklyn-based Das Racist-associated pop crew Tony Castles recently released the No Service EP, a five song collection featuring a track called "Dream Job" -- though not all the work the "freak funk" trio are here to discuss sounds especially dreamy. Guitarist/keyboardist Willie Miesmer is employed by WNYC and drives a truck for an antique… More »

Onetime Gravy Train!!!! frontman Seth Bogart is the leopard-printed/speedo-wearing Hunx of Hunx And His Punx (or, these days, Punkettes). His Oakland-based band's debut album comes out next month. In addition to his campy vintage rock 'n' roll and that Girls video cameo (remember, it was his penis being used as a microphone), Bogart… More »

I first saw Buke And Gass last summer at Joe's Pub as part of the Happy Ending Music & Reading Series. They performed some of their songs on a bill where I did a reading about black metal (and, separately, Colin Stetson made his saxophone sound like black metal). I'd never heard them before… More »

The Bubu King EP -- a four-song collection that marries hyper ramshackle beats with addictive West African chants and singing -- breezes past in 20 minutes. On certain days I listen to it half a dozen times in a row. Janka Nabay, the man behind the collection, came to the States from Sierra Leone eight year… More »

Salome is one of the most exciting bands in underground metal. We're talking top 5. I booked the Virginia trio twice in a four month span for my old Show No Mercy series because they're so compelling live -- they could be counted on to blow away just about any audience with their cathartic, smart,… More »

The Austin garage trio Woven Bones make dark, fuzzed, primitive, foot-stomping garage rockabilly shot through with J&MC, VU, and the Damned. (And you can extend that list to include a number of "the" bands: the Gun Club, the Troggs, the Cramps, etc.) I say trio, but right now guitarist/vocalist Andrew Burr and bassist Matty Nichol… More »

Reyna Kay is one half of Blessure Grave, the gothy Hellhammer-referencing South California death rock band and one-time Outsiders you should expect big things from in 2010. (Well, amongst those of us who listen to Swans, Cocteau Twins, KUKL, and old Siouxsie & the Banshees and feel our hearts skip a beat.) When I… More »

San Francisco's the Fresh & Onlys make for great autumn listening. There's something gothy about their psychedelic rock 'n' roll swing, but the sort of vintage wind-blown vibe that's more internal than dyed hair or eyeliner. That atmosphere was definitely there on "Invisible Forces" and "Dude's Got A Tender Heart." You know, a… More »

A couple of months ago, we posted Bear In Heaven's "Lovesick Teenagers" in the midst of the deaths of John Hughes and Patrick Swayze. It colored the song then and has provided me a framework that still affects me when I hear it. The Jon Philpot-fronted Brooklyn (via Georgia and Alabama) quartet offer a… More »

When we called recent Philadelphia/New York crew Cold Cave a Band To Watch last December, we mentioned Heartworm Press, which frontman Wesley Eisold runs with the writer, curator, and now-again Cold Cave member Max G. Morton (who shows up candleside in the video for "Love Comes Close"). Heartworm released the first Cold… More »

The sunny psychedelic pop housed on LAKE's Let's Build A Roof deepens and interestingly darkens the Olympia group's previous output. The dozen songs were produced by Karl Blau, someone who clearly has a knack for adding layers without losing a creaky, natural spaciousness (and someone they tour with in October/November). A ways back I… More »

When we spoke with Matt Popieluch about non-album track "Wander Aimlessly," the Foreign Born vocalist/guitarist/"lo-fi renaissance man" mentioned that the song was partially inspired while he was driving to "a shitty temp job." A few days later I asked him about his current employment situation and it turns out he works for the environmental… More »

At the beginning of the year, we said UK trio the Rayographs were a band worth watching. As mentioned then, guitarist/vocalist Astrud Steehouder conjures Grace Slick (or, to get more contemporary, Mira Billotte working with the Breeders) amid the band's dark psychedelia. They had a great first 7" then. There's a great second 7"… More »

Lately Brooklyn's the Antlers have been the topic of more (and more) conversations. Yesterday we posted a track from the icily anthemic trio's self-released and emotionally drained/draining Hospice, which is about to be re-released via Frenchkiss. (If you haven't heard it, as mentioned previously, it's currently streaming at Spinner.) The band's here today… More »

So far the group-chanting Brooklyn BTW Suckers are best known for their outfits, a self-titled EP produced by Yeasayer's Anand Wilder and Chris Moore (TV On The Radio, Yeah Yeah Yeahs), and a lineup featuring fellow BTW Quinn Walker. That, and a "2080"-style, occasionally dub-y sound constructed from joyful synth-and-percussion combos. Now maybe… More »

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Last spring the world got a brief preview of Once Upon A Time In Shaolin, the secret Wu-Tang Clan album that will be released in a limited edition of 1 and auctioned off to the highest bidder. That might be all most of us hear from the project for the rest of our… More »

Kanye West debuted his much-leaked single "All Day" at the Brit Awards last week, and now a studio version has emerged. The So Help Me God song's bouncy, bass-heavy beat also features verses from Allan Kingdom and Theophilus London, and a massive "Monster"/"Black Skinhead"-style riff slices through the track from time… More »

Carly Rae Jepsen's "Call Me Maybe" was one of the defining jams of summer 2012, but it was the sort of song that screamed "one-hit wonder" from the rooftops. Well, that's not going to be the case. Today, Jepsen comes back with a new single called "I Really Like You," and it is absolute top-shelf… More »

Mumford & Sons have announced the details of their third full-length, Wilder Mind, and it's bound to sound pretty different from the rest of the folk-rock group's output. As As they told Rolling Stone, the band went completely electric for the new album, ditching the folkier elements that catapulted them to fame. "We felt… More »

Die Antwoord seemed to be on the verge of climbing to a new tier of celebrity this year with Ninja and Yolandi Visser playing prominent roles in the dystopian sci-fi twee oddity Chappie. Now they'll definitely be more famous, but not for the right reasons; notorious might be a better word for it. Drake and… More »